A Woman's Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu Blog

Main menu

Post navigation

Beautiful Day

“Teach me, I know I’m not a hopeless case.” -U2

When I left the tournament last Saturday, I was thinking “Screw Jiu-Jitsu, I’m done!”, which I knew was a major overreaction, and although I’ve now gotten over what happened, I’ve still been feeling a little discouraged. They say Jiu-Jitsu is perfect for small people against big people, then after I’ve been training for over seven years, and I’m a three-stripe blue belt who can’t even defeat a bigger white belt, sometimes I feel that the claim is either bullshit, or more likely, I just suck royally. My main goal in BJJ is really to improve myself, and sometimes that can be difficult to assess when it still seems like I fail most of the time, but thankfully I’ve come to realize that no matter whether I succeed or not (in competition or in training), I still get the same benefits, and the only thing that I don’t get very often is the ego gratification that comes from winning, but I guess I don’t need it that badly, which may be the main reason I didn’t say “F BJJ!” a long time ago.

I actually did have some rare personal successes during free-rolling in the advanced class last night, including two subs on a male blue belt (a kimura from guard, and a freedom lock -aka the submission formally known as an americana- from side control), but even if I had just been dominated by everyone (which often happens), I still wouldn’t consider it a “bad day”. Every day that I’m able to train is a good day, and one of the most helpful things Professor Greg ever told me is that he didn’t care if I win, all that matters to him is that I exhibit proper technique (even if it’s unsuccessful), and last night my technique might not have been perfect, but it’s definitely getting better!